1. "People deserve freedom to use marijuana. we should ask "Why should marijuana be illegal?" From a philosophical point of view, individuals deserve the right to make choices for themselves. The government only has a right to limit those choices if the individual's actions endanger someone else. This does not apply to marijuana, since the individual who chooses to use marijuana does so according to his or her own free will. The government also may have a right to limit individual actions if the actions pose a significant threat to the individual. But this argument does not logically apply to marijuana because marijuana is far less dangerous than some drugs which are legal, such as alcohol and tobacco." The prescription drug industry is a joke. They have brainwashed the public into thinking their chemically enhanced drugs are beneficial. Honestly, I used to be against marijuana, but I have realized that classifying it as a drug is not right. It is a plant that is incredibly useful to us. Hemp is a wonderful agricultural source. People think you can get high off of hemp, but you don't. People are so confused about what marijuana does. They just assume it all gets you high, and is the "devil's grass" In fact, it is "one of the most therapeutic active substances known to man" (Former DEA chief)

2. Prohibition doesn't work

Take a stroll down memory lane and take a look at alcohol prohibition. It didn't work, hence it was revoked. Marijuana prohibition isn't working, obviously. Or else millions of people wouldn't use marijuana. It shouldn't be compared to hard drugs. They say it is a gateway drug, in a sense that is true. But that is because pot (being illegal) has been forced to be sold on the black market. And usually those dealers that sell pot, sell harder drugs, so obviously they will convince buyers to go up to more expensive harder drugs. Prohibition has caused it to be a gateway drug. As far as how your body reacts to pot, there is no evidence that it physically causes you to crave harder drugs. Am i saying it will never have a negative effect on you? NO. However, if you sit around a campfire for too long, that smoke probably will have a negative effect on you. If you don't like it, don't smoke it. For a country that advocates freedom, we sure put a lot of dumb restrictions on things that frankly, aren't very harmful. People blame weed for violence. True, people get killed in drug deals involving pot. Want to guess why? Its illegal. Anything illegal is bound to cause violence. I mean look what happened with alcohol prohibition. It wasn't much different. Violence is bound to occur when something becomes contraband. That leads to it being extremely profitable which leads to the risk of trafficking it. It generates non-taxable income, that is the problem.

i think it should stay illegal becuse i really hate the attitude of most people i'm around when they are stoned off smoking grass. seriously they bother me.

second: right now it's cheap i go get a half an ouce of some really nice soft fluffy bubs covered in hairs that stinks up the room in a few momnets and pay 100.00 american dollars if it was legal it would cost more taxes be a pain to deal with have to leave my ouse go to a store deal with the public. as it is today i send a text 20 minutes go by a person comes in they leave i smoke.

Okay, first of all, every point you brought up didn't address my points that favored legalization.

But I will adress your problems. First of all, we shouldn't keep it illegal just because you personally don't like how it makes people behave. We have kept many prescription drugs and alcohol legal, and frankly those two things alone make people act a lot stupider than people purely on marijuana. Alcohol is much more dangerous than marijuana. Anyway, I know plenty of intellectual and intelligent people that partake with marijuana. Some famous people include Carl Sagan (Renowned astrophysicist), Ted Turner (founder of CNN whom still enjoys a joint everyday), Stephen King (Famous author), etc.

And the smell is very easy to get rid of. Believe me, as a teenager, I have been in friends rooms where the smell has to be eliminated, and they succeed.

It is a natural plant that is considered worse than alcohol, and compared to drugs like cocaine in heroin, when really marijuana is the safer alternative. It doesn't kill brain cells, recent studies say it increases brain activity. http://budfacts.com...

I'm just arguing why it shouldn't be legal. seriously think of the people you have to deal with in a day that irritate you then make them high. see the point. it would be so much worse to be around. i know of the well known individuals who smoke weed and yet they don't need it legal to do it. people have been getting by just fine for the last 100 years or so with out it being legal the American population still gets high. you make it legal then you have taxes you have days you cant obtain the product just like with alcohol. i under stand your ideals on why it should be ok to smoke weed but i think it's better where it's at. people who smoke weed can obtain it when they want. people who don't. don't need the opportunity to become more annoying than they are now. you want to slow down crime just stop arresting people for it. want to save tax money stop arresting people for it.

what i truly think you want is not a full scale legalization but just the end of arresting people who enjoy smoking a hoot. to legalize would bring an entire new era of horrible issues with weed.

Decriminalizing, I could accept that. I just hate seeing people get arrested for simple possession of it. It goes on their permanent record and they weren't causing any harm to anybody. If it was legal, that wouldn't be an issue, and also those hardcore drug dealers who grow it and make 300,000 dollars a year with no taxes wouldn't be able to get away with that. There are so many hardworking and honest people that make barely any money, yet growers can pull in major bank from growing it. Plus the trafficking of marijuana is what leads to all the violence. If it's legal, we don't have to worry about the violence that comes with that. Plus, we could grow it recreationally to smoke, and not just to make a ton of money.

Actually, keeping marijuana illegal is costing us a ton of money. We spend millions, possibly billions on anti-marijuana campaigns, and police forces to enforce marijuana laws and raid marijuana gardens. Those people that go to jail, well the money the taxpayers pay goes towards prisons. Do you really want your money going towards the arrest of a peaceful, harmless person who just happens to like to get high? Not me. We currently spend more than twice as much money on police forces to chase down marijuana than we do on public education. What a joke. If it's legalized, we could finally start spending money on useful things.

My opponent believes that just because marijuana becomes legal that private dealers of it will no longer exist. I find this to be a naive statement as I think more people would simply grow there own planets and distribute under the table. With it no longer being illegal people wouldn't worry as they do to day. With the risk of being a criminal act gone nothing would denture people from growing and distributing for them selves. Still not paying taxes still generating large quantities of of private income. To assume that just because it's legal that people wouldn't still be private dealers is absurd. My opponent has stated that the trafficking of marijuana is what leads to all violence. what a bold and unwarranted statement. the supporter of this legalized marijuana would lead all the people to believe that once it's legal all violence will stop. This is off the chart wrong he couldn't find proof of it even if I asked.

This supporter of legalizing weed would like you to also forget when they begin talking about all the arrests for marijuana and the usage of it, that that all violence is caused by marijuana and switches his assumption and claims that marijuana smokers are quote peaceful, harmless people who just happen to want to get high. Well my friends if they are so harmless and peaceful where is all the violence coming from. He claims our country wastes millions even possibly billions of dollars to track, apprehend, and incarcerate these marijuana smokers and that those dollars could be spend else where more useful things. However by there own outlandish accusations earlier what would be better than arrest all these violence causing marijuana supports and users.

Keep in mind the difficult dessicon our country would have with all the people currently in jail for such marijuana offenses. what do we do with them? Are they released since their crime is no longer against the law? Do we force them to finish out there sentencing since they were unfortutante enough to be caught before the law was abolished? Isn't a little absurder to keep people in jail or prison for charges that aren't still illegal. What all the judges and prosocuters who have entire crimal cases bases around individuals and the things they did while on the currently illegal product of marijuana. Are those cases dismissed charges reduced? How does our country handle such things.

I urge people that since to many things are still unknown about what our country should do and how it mandate all the things required to legalize marijuana it remain outlawed. Not because it's worst than heroin or cocaine or even that it's on equal or less safe than alcohol. Honestly who really wants all the hassle of dealing with lines at the store for a bag of smoke while the retailer tries to explain to the other customers where each plant came from and what traits it might do for you. Then charge you any price they dream up while looking at you going "yeah man tax's" My opponent never bothered to address all the hassle and annoyance every one would suffer from the people who would now be high. not only would those individuals you can't stand now be able to smoke weed creating them to be even more obnoxious but that would no longer be forced to smoke horrible smelling, tasting, dirt weed. Do you really want those people who made fun of you in high school to actually get their hands on premium high grade super buds? I think not. Then with marijuana being legal it would be more open for talks everyone would want to share the stories of what herb they had yesterday and what store cared the purple sticky icky. Those teenagers at taco bell that make your food gross sloppy spilling out all over the wrapping or completely mes up your order. No I'm not saying they aren't high already. They really are stoned but marijuana is currently illegal so they aren't super high yet and they still can't squirt cheese in a container with out getting all over the side. You know what happens when it's legal these young kids will smoke until they can't even tie there shoes. Turning your fast food drive thru run while in a hurry in to a nightmare taking forever cause you get it back 3 times wrong and before they hand it to you right they will forget that you even ordered.

The supporter of marijuana legalization would like you all to ignore and forget about the personal inconveniences that everyone will have to suffer through. Is it really worth it? To constantly be annoyed more in life than we already are just because we might save a few million dollars not attempting to arrest these marijuana smoking people. It appears that people who want to smoke weed can locate a source and indulge them selves enough as it is. Let us not make it easier for them.

i enjoy my booze and want to keep my weed for my self. i know more marijuana was out lawed than 90% of Americans and it was all political garbage but yet i really don't ant people i don't like near me talking about of high they got. or where to go and get the best stash. i truly don't want it to be legal for very selfish reasons. mainly too many retards would annoy me if every one had access to weed,

there arn't any logical reason marijuana should be out lawed so i was never able to argue that in stead i just took the time to speak about all the ideas he had that are true and won't work plus who wants to smoke week with there dad or boss or that little twerp from work you always hated.

Pro brought up a number of arguments, such as cost, prohibition, liberty, the good effects it can have, the small bad effects it has compared to other legal things. He stated how alcohol was considered more dangerous. Con doesn't even try to refute him at first and uses personal opinion arguments. He also basically supports pro's prohibition argument, and does not respond to pros liberty argument. Thus his arguments had to outweigh pros, but pro actually responded to all of cons arguments. The fact that marijuana increases brain activity was quite interesting. Pro pointed out that legalizing marijuana would save America millions or billions of dollars, and make things more fair to workers. He also showed that it would lessen crime. Con uses new arguments in the last round which are therefore ignored.

Pro was the only one to use a source however there were many times where he should have used sources and did not. So sources are tied. Con's S/G was terrible.